As Harry hopped around on one foot on the balance beam, Etienne began to speak.
"Harry, we cannot remain in this old science lab forever."
"Have you forgotten that it's hell out there?" Harry asked, switching from one foot to the other as if he were river dancing. Piranhas nipped at his toes, but Harry deftly avoided them.
"We must leave this place, Harry. We must go...to Tristram!"
Harry blinked. "You're already here."
"No, I mean the VILLAGE Tristram."
Harry regarded him awkwardly and then asked "Why?" Tristram smiled wisely and said "To stop Diablo." Harry said "Why should I stop Diablo?" And Tristram smiled wisely and said "You must do it to save the world, Harry. Because you are the chosen one."
Harry stared at Etienne balefully. "I never asked for this."
That evening Hermione found a crate full of cakes and Etienne, Harry and her sat around in a courtyard eating the cakes. Harry lit a cigarette and looked up. The sky was a murky black-red with no clouds twenty four hours a day. There was no wind, no cool breezes to soothe wounded hearts, no soft rains. Harry ached for the comfort of the Earth he knew and loved, and yet – here, with Hermione, he could be happy.
In the morning the three set out across the obsidian hellscape, rain beating down around them and hissing into steam as it hit the radioactive lava. Etienne's metier was soaked. Harry rode a motorcycle he found in the facility and Hermione walked. The motorcycle was broken down and useless, like everything in hell but Harry had repaired it with augments. It belched a foul cloud of black smoke that mingled with the rain as he pedaled his way along the obsidian hellscape.
Suddenly, there was a noise. Ahead of them, the ground rumbled and split open, shards of jet, splinters of obsidian flying, as demons jumped out at them. Harry hit one with his motorcycle, and the horned demon twice as tall as a man with bronze hide crumpled with the force of the iron hog colliding with it. Demonic viscera sprayed in every direction. Harry couldn't stop the motorcycle in time, and there was a loud scrunch as the metal was flattened and the demonic viscera went flying. Harry flew off and landed in a conveniently placed haystack. And he cried. Life was so unfair.
Etienne punched out the demons and they died.
"Diablo is trying to stop us, Harry. He doesn't want us to get to Tristram. If we get to Tristram, we can seal the hell portal up and stop Diablo's plan of world conquest!" Harry smiled with hope at Etiennes statement.
Harry got back on his motorcycle and they drove away, rain pouring down in sheets now like a waterfall occupying everywhere at once, so really more like torrents. But it wasn't biblical because it didn't flood the world. The basalt plains of hellish rock hissed as steam rose from the lava vents.
They stopped at a hotel, and set off in the morning towards Tristram after a light continental breakfast, getting ever closer to their final goal. Whatever awaited them at the village of Tristram, Harry was ready.
Etienne wiped Harry's nose with a Kleenex. Harry had picked up a flu somewhere along the road through the blistering obsidian hellscape and they had stopped at an abandoned gas station. The structure was dilapidated, with a puddle of gasoline pooling outside and a dilapidated sign with dilapidated letters spelling out "OBSIDIAN HELLSCAPE PUMP AND DUMP" on it.
Hermione ripped the sleeve off her hoodie to make bandages for Harry. They had jury rigged a bed from a pile of national geographic and inquirers. They had laid out a sheet of fiberglass on top to make it more comfortable. Harry rolled around in it exultantly, phlegm flying from every orifice.
Hermione ripped the metier off Etienne's head to make a pillow when stuffed with inedible preserved foodstuffs taken from the now-dead freezer in the back. As Harry laid his head on the improvised pillow, a stream of twinkie filling squirted out the end.
"Oh Hermione" said Harry "I feel like I am going to die." Hermione pressed a damp hoodie sleeve rag on his head until he passed out. Then she wiped his nose again.
Harry sat up "I need to stop DIABLO!" he yelled, but then he collapsed again. "Harry" said Etienne as he smiled wisely "You need to conserve your strength. And he tenderly stroked Harry's forelock."
They fed Harry fruit juice past the best before date and he spat it out. "It's okay, Harry" said Hermione. "You're augmented so you can't get food poisoning."
"I AM NOT AUGUMENTED!" Harry screamed, and he threw his head back down on the metier, a stream of snot and tears shining in the air, the cigarette went flying. There was a gooshy noise and Etienne ducked to avoid the stream of delicious cream filling and cockroaches.
"Oh look, silly girl. You upset him." Tristram said, shoving Hermione aside and dabbing at Harry's eyes. "There, there" he said, smiling wisely. Harry started to feel better, but then he felt sad again.
They watched Flight of the Concords on a television set Harry found and repaired with his augments. Harry lit a cigarette and then the three sat down to watch. Harry cried when Mel won the race because he was so emotional, and when the movie ended he fell fast asleep.
The next morning Harry was surly and complained to Etienne. "I haven't had a cigarette for weeks, I'm feeling terrible. I am in withdrawal." Etienne just smiled wisely, but Harry continued. "I just want to withdraw from the world."
Etienne looked down at him. "Loser." he said.
"What?" asked Harry, surprised.
"LOSER! LOSER! YOU'RE A LOSER! YOU ARE NOTHING! YOU ARE DIRT!" screamed Etienne. Harry smiled and said "I think I understand." And then he got better.
Early in the morning, Harry felt something in his shoulderblades shift. Then something went "SPROING" and Harry shot up wide awake. He didn't see anything because his shirt was ripped and covering his face. Harry took his shirt off (You could see his muscular, plastic chest piece. It was slightly incongruous looking because it didn't quite match his natural skin tone).
Sticking out of his back were a set of enormous, polyresin chromium steel wings with little helicopter thingies and jets and metal feathers. They were painted black, like the rest of Harry's augments. They were perhaps twelve feet wide apiece, weighing in at around forty pounds each, and had little electrical cables strung around them. On the tip of his right wing there was a note.
Harry snatched it. It was from Dr. Reed. It said:
"Harry,
When you were nearly drowned at the Black Mesa Incident, I decided to put these wings in you during surgery in case one day you might need them. I didn't tell you because you might be upset about it but I know it was the right decision. I love you,
Megan"
Harry burst into tears and lit himself a cigarette. Wiping his eyes on the letter, the ink smudged and ran down his face like tears, only black like ink. He remembered a long time ago, Megan and Him went on a date and bought hotdogs and sat down on a picnic bench. They watched Geese flying north for the winter and Megan told Harry that she had always secretly wanted to have giant mechanical wings with jets in them. Harry had laughed at the time, but now...now he would never see her again. She would have wanted this, not him...never him. Harry ate the note to destroy it, making the writing part of himself forever.
Hermione and Etienne woke up. Hermione sat up and looked at Harry, and her face lit up like it was Christmas. "Harry" She said "You have wings!"
Harry only grunted.
"This is so cool! I've always wanted giant metal wings with helicopter blades and jets!" she said, and then she saw he was crying. "Oh Harry, it's not a bad thing! Being augmented is good!"
"I AM NOT AUGUMENTED!" Harry screamed and he tried to shield himself from view with his wings, accidentally snapping himself in the face. His tears sparkled in the hellfire. Harry didn't care that Hermione thought his wings were spiffy, Harry hated being augmented. Because Harry was augmented he would never see his family again.
Etienne weighed his opinion in. "Harry, think how proud your parents would be to know that you now have a twenty-four foot wingspan!"
"MY PARENTS ARE DEAAAAAAAAAAD!" Harry screamed at the sky, sinking to his knees. Thunder rolled across the plains. Harry wept. Etienne only smiled wisely. "Harry, your parents will never be truly dead while you are here."
Harry smiled. "You think so?" he asked.
"No." said Etienne.
Harry ran away as fast as he could. He ran through the obsidian hellscape, tears steaming out behind him, barely doing four miles an hour because of his bulky eighty pound wings. Harry half-ran, half waddled like a goose until he came to a cliff. Harry just wanted it to end. So he jumped off the cliff, chuffing for breath like a locomotive powered by prayer.
Part way down, Harry realized this was probably a bad idea.
Screaming incoherently, wishing he was somewhere else, he flailed desperately in a downward spiral, ground looming closer and closer and closer and suddenly he was soaring on an updraft that smelled of sulfur and ash. Soaring, like a goose.
Harry felt free for once in his life, felt whole soaring, soaring over the obsidian hellscape. He was in hell, yes. He was involved in massive corporate conspiracies, yes. He was travailing with an abusive spirit guide and a doormat, yes. He wasn't even a human being anymore, yes. Hagrid was dead, yes. Reed was kidnapped, yes. Dumbledore was actually Diablo, yes. His head still hurt when he was shaken by the hair back in the streets of Detroit, yes. He had just recently recovered from a ghastly flu, yes. He had recently crawled through a sewer, yes, and come to think of it that's probably where he picked the flu up. He had been thrown through a porcelain sink and several bathroom stalls by a cybernetic bear, yes. But it felt like he was in Heaven.
Eventually Harry got bored and decided to return to Etienne and Hermione. So he turned back towards where he remembered them being in a wide loop, until eventually the telescopes in his eyeballs spotted the two of them. He settled in for a landing.
Etienne and Hermione watched as Harry smashed into the ground at ninety miles an hour, ruining their game of go-fish utterly as he dug a forty foot long furrow in the obsidian hellscape, sending the cards flying.
The two walked over to Harry and helped him up. Etienne smiled wisely and said "Someday, Harry, this power will save you in your darkest hour of need." Harry only frowned. "I never ask-"
He never saw the slap coming but he certainly felt it.
"Harry, because you have faith, you are strong. We do not choose the paths we are given. We must simply follow our destinies." Harry responded with a quote from friedrice Neizsheneishe "All credibility, all good conscience, all evidence of truth come only from the senses."
Etienne laughed and the three of them walked into the sunset...towards Tristram.